Trophic position of small mammals in Chile a review Posiciones troficas de pequenos mamiferos en Chile una revision

Trophic position of small mammals in Chile a review Posiciones troficas de pequenos mamiferos en Chile una revision

Silva, S.I.

Revista Chilena de Historia Natural. Septembre; 783: 589-599

2005

I reviewed dietary information of 25 species of small mammals inhabiting Chile and published in I I scientific articles. I divided the contribution of each food item in five categories: fungi, vegetation, seeds, fruits and insects. This approach allowed me to represent the information documented in the form of De Finetti diagrams, in which the trophic position of a species is represented by a point in an equilateral triangle. Through correspondence analysis, I determined statistically the groups inside the diagram De Fenetti. This analysis allowed me to group the species in seven trophic categories: herbivorous, insectivorous, omnivorous, granivorous-frugivorous, herbivorous/granivorous-frugivorous, herbivorous/insectivorous. Food habits of species in Muridae family incorporate mixed diets with a percentage fluctuation of each item, changing its food habits significantly among localities. The species A. bennetti, A. cinerea, A. andinus. C. lanigera, L. viscacia, M. niata, O. bridgesi and Thylamys elegans incorporate monospecific diets with representativeness of 90 % of consumed item.